The Whale v.s. The Veil

Part of traveling in foreign countries is getting used to the language barriers. Luckily for me, many Berliners speak at least a little English. Which is great, because mein Deutsch ist schlecht!
My dance company director, Zadiel Sasmaz, is kind enough to explain his classes in both English and Deutsch. And while his English is pretty good, he still makes the occasional mistake, some of which are quite funny. One day he was listing off things that I needed to buy for our upcoming choreographies. “You’ll need black pants, and you’ll need to buy a cane. You know what is a cane?” I nodded ‘yes’. “Good,” he said. “Oh, and you’ll need to buy a whale.”
“A what?!” I gasped.
“A whale,” Zadiel said, very matter of fact.
We looked at each other for a moment, realizing that there was some kind of language barrier happening. “Do you know what I mean by ‘whale’?” Zadiel asked me.
I laughed and said, “Zadiel, a whale is an animal that lives in the ocean! Do you mean ‘veil’?”
“Oh yes, I do mean ‘veil’.”
Two weeks later, and Zadiel is still having a hard time pronouncing “veil” correctly, and every time he says “whale” I picture a belly dancer holding a whale above her head.
Deutsch words can be funny all on their own, too. It may seem juvenile, but I can’t help but giggle whenever I see or hear the words einfahrt (drive in) and ausfahrt (drive out). “In fahrt!” I yell to my boyfriend when I see the word. “Out fahrt!” he replies. Yes, we are just like five year olds sometimes, but it’s healthy to embrace your inner child, right?
A lot of Deutsch words are similar to English words. For example milch is “milk”. So, you can imagine my confusion when I saw a carton in the supermarket that was labeled dick milch. Now what the hell is that supposed to mean?
Ok, one more story. I’m gonna take it back a couple years to Nicaragua. My mom is going to kill me for writing about this, but it’s so worth it. We were doing a Spanish language course in San Juan Del Sur. My mom had to go around and ask all the students, “Hola. Como estas? Yo soy Roberta. Yo tengo 47 años. Cuantos años tiene?” Except she kept saying anos instead of años. Do I need to tell you what anos means? “Hi, how are you? I am Roberta. I have 47 anuses. How many anuses do you have?”
In good fun, my teacher enthusiastically responded, “Solo uno!”. Just one.

What it's Like to Work with a Gay Male Belly Dancer

(who's incredibly hot!)
When one thinks of belly dance, a voluptuous woman often comes to mind (in fact, the first comment I usually receive when I tell someone I'm a belly dancer is, "Really? But you don't have a belly!"). Ah, the stereotypes of belly dance. Women of all ages, shapes and sizes can be great belly dancers. And surprisingly enough, so can men.
There's been a resurgence of male belly dancers lately, and most (but not all) are gay. And it is such a tease! Belly dancing is a great workout, so most male belly dancers have amazing bodies- six pack abs, solid biceps, and a NICE ass!
Zadiel Sasmaz, the director of my dance company, is a case in point. Just the other day, I was sitting in rehearsal with Eyyam and Cathy. Zadiel was changing in the corner. We couldn't help but look over (what girl could resist). "Darn," I said, "It's too bad he's gay." Eyyam jumped up and said, "No, it's not like 'darn'. It's more like," and she pretended to kick the wall and stomp the ground and pull out her hair. See what these male belly dancers are doing to us?!
No, but really, we love them, the gay male belly dancers. They're kindred spirits, and awesome performers. And there are lots of perks to hanging out with them. I went out to the most popular gay club in Berlin with Zadiel, Rachid (another male belly dancer), Eyyam and Cathy. It was great to be with the best dancers in the club, and to be surrounded by the hottest men (even though they were so unavailable to us girls).
Also, I never have to worry about doing my own makeup for a show, because if a gay man is handy, chances are he's been to some form of beauty school (and I know that is a stereotype, but it's often been my experience!).
Lastly, the gay male belly dancers always love me just for my dancing, because I'll never be eye candy to them. Except, maybe, in my dreams.
Videos links to some great male belly dancing:
Zadiel Sasmaz
Rachid Alexander

Busking Permit for Berlin U-BAHN

What a wild goose chase we had with finding where to get a busking permit for the UBAHN (subway) in Berlin! We asked a police officer and he gave us an address of a building, but the person at the building said no, the permit office was at another place. But that place didn’t work out either. So, we pirated for a while until we got busted by the police. I have to say, the police were nice about it and gave us (finally) the correct address for the permit office. However, they gave us the wrong time and days. We trekked out to the permit office (which is located in a most inconvenient location), but discovered that the office was only open on Wednesday.
So, here it is, the official information on where and when to get a permit for busking in Berlin (since the information is not located anywhere else on the web):
U7 to Rathaus Stegliz (the permit office is in the station)
Wednesday 7am-11am
And that is the only time available to get a permit! Permits cost 6.40 euro per day, per person and are good for the following week. Don’t forget to arrive early, or else all the good stations will already be taken! Sheesh.
*no permit needed for playing above ground, unamplified*